642
PAR TIS AN REV lEW
affect: I remember a conversation several years ago with Andre Cluy–
tens, who had just returned from conducting
Die M eistersinger
in Bay–
reuth. He had been given eighty rehearsals, whereas it is difficult at
the Opera, with the resources at its disposal, to obtain ten. For this
reason, as at the Comedie-Franc;aise, the last director, M. Georges Hirch,
and especially his predecessor, M . Andre Lehman, had tried to make
the Opera "box office." The result was a production of
Les Indes
Galantes
that made a Rameau
divertissement
into a kind of music hall
extravaganza, and a
Magic Flute
during which the noise of the scenery
changes drowned out the singers' voices. Malraux apparently wants
to restore all the Opera's old luster, and he remarks that if the State
grants an annual five-hundred million francs to the Opera Comique,
"it is not to make it the rival of Romorantin's theater," which is, in
fact, what it has become. Of course we are delighted to be told that
Wozzeck
is going to be produced in France at last. But what we have
not been told, and what seems important, is whether an intelligent
di–
vision of repertory between the two houses has been made. There has
never been any question, of course, of playing Wagner at the Opera
Comique or
Carmen
at the Opera- though either would be possible. But
the errors I have just referred to must be avoided:
The Magic Flute
and
in
fact all Mozart's operas, including
Don Giovanni,
are more at
home at the Opera Comique than at the Opera, simply by virtue of
the necessary relation between singers and orchestra.
What we must point out, finally, without blaming Andre Malraux
for it, is that in dealing with the problems of the national theaters, and
in settling them as well as possible, only the most obvious and urgent
issues have been considered. A French national theater policy must be
essentially decentralizing in its effect. The same applies to a similar
musical policy. Aside from Strasbourg for symphonic concerts and
Toulouse for singing, France is terribly poor in orchestras and com–
panies. As for the theater, nothing need prevent the support and even
the multiplication of the provincial dramatic centers (which, when well
directed, have scored considerable successes). Nothing, that is, save the
lack of funds. For in France such enterprises exist only thanks to the
State. Since private individuals and local groups are unable or unwilling
to support them, it is up to the State to effect this decentralization. A
real national theater policy does not mean merely putting on Racine
in Paris rather than Labiche.
It
means permitting the inhabitants of
Quimper or of Brive-la-Gaillarde to see both, and above all it means
giving those inhabitants the desire to see them.
Jean Bloch-Michel
(translated
by
Richard Howard)
